SONA 2024 Summary

While investors were disappointed that Ramaphosa did not reveal the date of the upcoming general elections during his address (which commenced at 19h00 local time on Thursday, 8 February 2023), he did touch on the National Health Insurance (NHI) Bill – saying that it is almost ready to be passed into law, and also focused on the energy crisis and rail challenges in the country.

Ramaphosa also expressed that Government remains confident that loadshedding will soon become a thing of the past as the National Energy Crisis Committee continues to implement new energy generation methods, saying that:

"There are phenomenal developments that are driving the restructuring of our electricity sector in line with what many other economies have done to increase competitiveness and bring down prices. Through all of these actions, we are confident that the worst is behind us and the end of loadshedding is finally within reach. But we are not stopping there. To ensure that we never face a similar crisis ever again, we are reforming our energy system to make it more competitive, sustainable, and reliable into the future".

While acknowledging SA’s alarming unemployment rate, Ramaphosa spoke about potential investments which could create jobs, and he also addressed the issue of crime and corruption, noting that the National Prosecuting Authority’s Asset Forfeiture Unit is continuously working to retrieve money stolen during the State Capture era. “A revitalised South African Revenue Service has collected R4.8 billion in unpaid taxes as a result of evidence presented at the [State Capture] Commission, while the Special Investigating Unit has instituted civil litigation to the value of R64 billion,” he said.

The establishment of a climate change response fund will address "persistent calamities" like the annual wildfires in the Western Cape and floods in KwaZulu-Natal. He also went on to say that the nation’s rail system is being redesigned to permit private train operators to use the rail network in future.

The rand was little changed following the speech, trading at R18.93 against the US dollar.

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